


Road to Home Series Outtakes/Deleted Scenes

by PoppyAlexander



Category: Doctor Who (2005), Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Takes, Angst, Apologies, Crossover, Declarations Of Love, Drama, Feels, Forgiveness, Friendship, Hand Jobs, Kissing, M/M, Mushy, Outtakes, Sweet, Texting, Total Soap Opera Moment, notes from the margins
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-04-14
Updated: 2014-04-18
Packaged: 2018-01-19 07:59:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,247
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1461751
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PoppyAlexander/pseuds/PoppyAlexander
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stories, snippets, ficlets, and notes related to my Road to Home series of Sherlock stories. Some will work as stand-alones, some won't. Some may be unpolished.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Unworthy

**Author's Note:**

> This is going to be a collection of stories/ficlets/etc related to my 13-part series, "Road to Home." That series is complete and I'm happy with it, but there are a few loose ends I wanted to tie up, and a few scenes I had in mind that didn't make it into the series for whatever reason.
> 
> My usual warning applies, that I reserve the "Explicit" rating for kink/non-con/violence/possible triggers, so bear in mind that these outtakes contain graphic sexual language.

_(This story takes place several weeks after "Code Switch," wherein Sherlock and John had a massive argument, and later Donna had a psychotic breakdown related to post-partum depression. It is full of mushy feels and angst and I would have thrown up in my mouth writing it except that there's also sex. You're warned: high-drama, operatic Feels lay ahead! But I just couldn't let those awful things John said float out there in the world and never be talked about again. -x0x0- PoppyAlexander)_

 

*

Sherlock snatched John’s phone from his hand, dropped it into a small African pot that had recently appeared on the mantel.

“I was only saying goodnight!”

“She’s fine.” Sherlock looked around on the nearby bookshelf until he found the lid for the pot, covered it. “Her meds have sorted her out, and as for the care of my precious jewels, Mrs Ehrlich couldn’t come more highly recommended.”

“Wish I could’ve seen the look on their faces when they heard you’d poached their nanny,” John commented with a smirk.

“Their brat will be fine; he’s still got the second-best nanny in England.”

“He hasn’t, though; she’s the one covers Mrs Ehrlich’s weekends and holidays.”

Sherlock slouched into his chair, legs extended in front of him. He went to work untying John’s shoes with his long, dexterous toes.

“Well, they want to be modern parents—him with the car seat, driving them home from hospital, quite a show—they can diaper the future king themselves.” Sherlock half-smiled.

His laces undone, John slid his shoes off and kicked them aside.

“Know what we did the past four nights?” John asked rhetorically. “Slept all night. I feel like a human being for the first time in two months. The trade-off, of course, is that now I have to run a scrum of elderly German women just to shake a rattle in my own children’s faces.” Sherlock’s toes were creeping up John’s ankles, beneath the hem of his trousers. “Which brings up the point that I thought au pairs were usually Swedish university students?”

 “The last thing you need is the temptation of a blonde, twenty-year-old Scandinavian right in your own home, John. I can’t have Donna finding you tomcatting around, getting furious, and running off with those babies.”

John laughed, shook his head. “First of all, I have my plate overfull already, with my ginger tornado up the road, and my misanthropic genius here.” Sherlock, closed-eyed, broke out in a cat-in-cream smile to hear himself described in such loving terms.  “Secondly, and I know I’ve said it before, but it does bear repeating: you’re a puzzle, Sherlock Holmes. ‘My precious jewels,’ he says. ‘Can’t let her run off with those babies,’ he says.”

Sherlock shrugged it off.

“Nevermind,” John said, voice quieting, “Frankly, I think it’s wonderful.” He drained the last of the whisky in his glass, rattled the half-melted ice cubes a bit.

Sherlock stood, started across the kitchen, unbuttoning his shirt cuffs as he went. When he was nearly to his room, he ordered, “Bed.”

John’s eyebrows went up. “We haven’t even had dinner,” he said to Sherlock’s empty chair.

“Bed!” Sherlock demanded from behind the half-closed door to his room.

John started to make his way to Sherlock’s room.

“John!”

“I wanted to talk—“

“BED!”

John found Sherlock reclining against the headboard, shirtless, hands behind his head, showing his lean, muscled frame to best advantage. John caught his breath.

“Jesus, I am blessed.”

He crawled up along the length of the mattress until his mouth crash-landed on Sherlock’s, sucking Sherlock’s lower lip between his own. Sherlock’s arms went around him, rucking up the back of John’s shirt, slipping his fingers into the back of John’s jeans. He felt Sherlock’s mouth curving into a grin against his own.

“You know,” Sherlock intoned quietly, “When they forbid you to have sex for six weeks after birth, that only applies to your missus.”

“I’m sorry,” John rasped between kisses, “I’m sorry. I’ve missed you.”

“’Course you have,” Sherlock said, and yanked John’s shirt over his head, tossed it onto the floor.

“’Course I have,” John echoed, half-smiling, then sinking further into Sherlock’s embrace, thrusting his tongue further into Sherlock’s eager mouth. Sherlock slipped one finger into the tangle of their tongues, then rubbed his spit-slicked fingertip in a tight circle around John’s nipple, making him gasp.

John’s hand slid down Sherlock’s chest and across his quivering stomach, went to work on the fasteners of his trousers; Sherlock hummed encouragement. Together they shimmied Sherlock’s trousers down and off, and they broke their kisses long enough for each of them to contribute to licking John’s palm, sucking his fingertips. He gripped Sherlock’s cock at the base and began to move, gently twisting his wrist, and Sherlock gasped into John’s mouth, sucking John’s breath away. Then—as ever—the flood of poetry.

“You’ve no idea how I’ve longed for you,” he muttered into John’s open mouth. “It’s like the shadow of you was everywhere, all the time—“ John made a particularly cunning move with his thumb against Sherlock’s foreskin, and Sherlock made a sound like a surprised sob. “—but it hasn’t been real you, real John. . .my John, mine. . .” He licked John’s tongue. “. . . _mine_. . .”

John tucked his nose into the spot just below Sherlock’s ear, against his jaw, worked his lips against the side of Sherlock’s throat. “I’m sorry,” he murmured, barely a whisper, he was so close to Sherlock’s ear he could be quiet, and in any event he felt dreamy and disconnected, “I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry. . .”

Sherlock raked his fingers through John’s hair, and his hips rolled against John’s hand, and his husky baritone shivered John’s bones as he intoned, “That’s brilliant. . .god, that’s brilliant. . .I’ve missed your skin, John, the smell of you.” John could feel Sherlock’s carotid pulse beating against his lip, slid his hand along Sherlock’s length, slick with his pre-cum and their saliva. Sherlock murmured, “All those chaste little kisses you gave me. . .on nights you didn’t stay. . .”

“I’m sorry. . .I’m sorry. . .”

“I made myself come every night, every day, with your name in my mouth,” Sherlock breathed, and John shifted his grip, and they both shuddered. “My John. My own.”

John drew back, gazed at Sherlock’s face: kiss-stung lips, closed eyes shadowed dark with desire. He started to shift himself downward, intending to take Sherlock into his mouth as well as his hand, but Sherlock caught his chin between his thumb and fingers. “Just like this,” he whispered, pulling John’s face close to his own. “Stay here and kiss me. Just like this. . .” Their faces nuzzled up against each other, parted lips, tongue-tips, eyelashes—a shared, secret language of feathery touches. “If you stop kissing me I might—“ Sherlock gulped air. “—die.”

“Shh,” John whispered, and nested his lips against Sherlock’s just so, sucked, nipped.

“John. . .” Sherlock moaned, and rested his hand on top of John’s hand as it stroked him, not guiding but following, and then he caught his breath and held it, and trapped John’s lower lip between his teeth, and then he let out a long, low groan and came, wet warmth spilling over John’s hand, his jeans, Sherlock’s own belly. “John, my John. . .” he whispered, and opened his mouth to let John’s tongue inside.

Sherlock heaved a few jagged breaths, still kissing, and then settled. Eventually he let his head fall back against the headboard, briefly fumbled in the drawer of the bedside table with one hand and passed John a handkerchief. John wiped his hand and Sherlock’s abdomen (eliciting a near-laugh; Sherlock was ticklish), tossed the hanky onto the floor.

“You make me think there might be something to the popular assertion that there are different kinds of genius,” Sherlock breathed, smiling slightly, raising John’s hand to his mouth and brushing his lips and the tip of his tongue against the pads of John’s fingers. John’s face was close to Sherlock’s, his eyes running riot across it, taking him in—dark waves of his fringe damp with sweat, eyes so pale and heavy-lidded, angles everywhere, and that mouth of his, jesus, that mouth. Sherlock held John’s gaze as his long, warm fingers dipped beneath the waistband of John’s jeans. “Now tell me what _you_ want,” he said quietly.

John took Sherlock’s face in his hands, stared at him hard. “I want you to listen to me,” he said, his voice grating across a lump in his throat. “Are you listening?” Sherlock nodded ever-so-slightly. John‘s face was solemn, determined. “I’m _sorry_.”

Sherlock’s eyebrows rose and his forehead wrinkled. “It’s only been a few weeks; your missus had twins. And a psychotic episode.” He reached for John’s forearm, started to pull John’s hand from his face.

“Not that,” John said. “Not _just_ that.” He bit his lips, and when he released them, they were trembling. “That night we argued. What I said to you. . .” Sherlock still looked vaguely puzzled; John’s eyes stung. “I wish I could take it back; I should never have said it.”

Sherlock worked his hands beneath John’s, lowered them against his chest, held them tightly. “It’s already forgotten.”

“No—“

“It was a difficult time; you were mad with exhaustion.”

“I can’t forget it, Sherlock.” Tears were streaming down John’s cheeks now, and his eyes were wide and searching, desperate. “God, Sherlock, what you went through—and for me to say you should never have come back—“

“Hush, now.”

“Sherlock.” The tone of his voice was desperate, so serious. “I’m _sorry_.” John freed his hands from Sherlock’s grasp, grabbed him by the shoulders, grounding himself with the feel of Sherlock’s skin, his muscles shifting beneath, because John was on the verge of flying apart. “Every minute since I said it, it’s all I can think about, and it was _so_ awful, _so_ cruel—to _you_ , Sherlock. . .” The hitch in his voice when he said “to you” portrayed utter disbelief that he could be so cruel to Sherlock, whom he loved, who had saved him. “Cruel to you?” He shook his head. “It just—“

Sherlock petted John’s chest, rested his palm in the center. “Hush, John, it’s forgotten.”

John shook his head, looked away, ashamed. “It’s just more proof that I don’t deserve this. Don’t deserve you. Never have.” He sat back, covered his face with his hands. “I’m not worthy of you, Sherlock.”

“Don’t be ri—“ Sherlock caught himself; during that same argument John had blown up at him about being dismissed as ridiculous. “John.” He kept his palm centered against John’s chest, with the other began to peel John’s hands from his face. “Eyes on me,” he implored in a near-whisper. John met Sherlock’s ice-blue gaze, blinked hard, looking miserable. “You are perfect. If anyone’s unworthy, it’s me.”

John shook his head. “When you—“ John started, couldn’t say the words: _when you were dead_. “While you were gone—“ His face screwed up in anguish and he swallowed hard; Sherlock winced. John’s words came out in a breathless tumble. “It plagued me, that I’d never told you how much you meant to me, how grateful I was that you saved me—you saved my life every minute of every day from the moment we met—how I would have laid down on any railway track, would have taken any bullet, would have done anything at all just to keep you—“

“I knew,” Sherlock said. “I still know.” He lifted John’s hand to his lips and kissed his knuckles.

“I should have told you. And then you were gone, and I’d never told you any of it, because I was a coward.” John shook his head. “So then I tried to drink myself to death. Fucked everyone who’d have me only hoping some jealous husband or boyfriend would put me out of my misery. If it hadn’t been for Donna. . .” He shrugged, looked skyward, cleared a lump from his throat.

“She saved you, too,” Sherlock said quietly. “She saved you, for me.”

“Another thing I’ll never understand,” John said. “I was an utter wreck, and she never put me off for a single minute. . .and she _married_ me?” His voice was disbelieving. “Married me, and your ghost, too,” he clarified. “Because that’s just the way it was, and she never questioned it.”

Sherlock said, “You know why she came back when she did. You needed each other.”

“We all three know Donna would have been just fine without me. But I’d have died without her. And now the babies. . .” At last, he smiled. “They definitely deserve better than me.”

“They’re your reward for surviving.”

“ _You’re_ my reward,” John corrected, instantly. “One I’ll never be worthy of. I mean, _clearly_. Those things I said, even as they were coming out of my mouth I knew I shouldn’t. . .”

“It’s forgotten,” Sherlock told him again. John shook his head.

“And I stupidly tell you there’s something wrong with you?  That’s more than unfair, when there’s so obviously something wrong with _me_.”

“No. You’re perfect,” Sherlock said, and took both John’s hands in his and kissed them. “That’s enough, now; I won’t have you speaking ill of my John Watson.” He half-smiled, but John looked agonized. Sherlock leaned to press his mouth against John’s breastbone. “You’re my heart,” he murmured against John’s chest, then raised his head to look up into John’s night-sky eyes. “You’re a wonder.”

“I’ll never forgive myself for the things I said. That this was too hard. This is a gift I shouldn’t even have been given. You coming back is the miracle I prayed for, every minute you were gone.” As John spoke, Sherlock guided him with persuasive hands to lie back on the bed, then stretched out beside him. “When you came back, I promised myself I’d work to be worthy of it; god, how I failed.”

Sherlock shook his head, pressed a kiss to John’s closed eye, brushing stray tears onto his bottom lip. The tip of his tongue slipped out to taste them. “You’re a dream I had once, a long time ago,” Sherlock said, his breath warm and moist on John’s temple. “You’re the only true thing.” He placed a kiss beside John’s ear, murmured, “You’re the proof of me.”

“Sherlock. . .” John whispered, his voice still thick with remorse like grief.

“Shhh. . .” Sherlock hushed, running his hand over John’s bicep, his forearm, then back up. “You are the star I followed all the way home.” Sherlock pressed his lips against John’s, dipped the tip of his tongue into John’s mouth, reached for his jeans’ belt and went to work with long-fingered hands. John’s arms went around Sherlock’s back, palms gliding up his neck, fingers through his hair, which made Sherlock’s eyes close. He laid a trail of kisses down John’s throat from his jaw to the hollow between his clavicles.

Sherlock whispered, “You’re perfect.” A kiss. “You’re brave.” Another kiss. “Handsome.” Another kiss, with lips bowed up in a smile against the side of John’s neck. “ _So_ handsome.” John pressed the tips of his entangled fingers against Sherlock’s scalp, gently scratched back and forth; Sherlock purred. “You’re everything I never knew I wanted.” Sherlock rested the side of his face against John’s shoulder, dragged it slowly across his chest, turned to drag it across in the other direction, inhaling John’s scent along the way. He pressed his lips against John’s scar, and John sucked in his breath, as he always did. Sherlock gentled him with a hand cupped around his shoulder.

“You survived a war so I could make you mine.”

John melted then, tension running out of every muscle, draining away into the mattress, the floor, the earth.

“And so I could be yours.”

John hummed with something that sounded like relief.

“I am, you know. . .”Sherlock whispered, raising his gaze to meet John’s. And he mouthed, _I’m yours_.

John smiled at last, closed his eyes, and let his head fall back.

 Sherlock kneeled up on the bed, straddling John’s thighs, and quickly went to work on the button and zip of his jeans. They both worked them down and off, followed by John’s boxers. Resting his elbows on either side of John’s head, Sherlock ducked down to kiss John deeply, lazily, then sighed out a low moan.

“I came back for you because I need you,” Sherlock intoned quietly, his lips brushing John’s. “And because you are my miracle.” John sighed into Sherlock’s mouth. “And because I love you.”

John held his breath.

“I love you,” Sherlock whispered again, “I love you.” John’s eyes were closed, his expression one of deep concentration, an intentional creation of a five-sense memory, preserving this exact moment in amber: the first and only moment when Sherlock said, _I love you_. Sherlock brought his lips close to John’s ear. “I love you. You are perfect. My John, my own. . .my heart, my star. . .my miracle. . .I love you. . .I love you. . .I love you.” Sherlock shifted his body’s position, and he could sense John cataloguing all the places where their skin touched. “I love you,” Sherlock whispered, and lifted his head to watch John’s face changing: his closed eyes, his lips parting as his breath came harder.

Sherlock said, “John,” and John half-opened his eyes, met Sherlock’s gaze. Sherlock mouthed, _I’m yours,_ _I love you, I’m yours_. He waited. John nodded, closed his eyes for longer than a blink. When he opened them again, Sherlock opened his mouth into a small “o” and pushed his thumb in, circling it with his tongue. John sucked in his breath.

“God,” John breathed, “Do that again.” And Sherlock watched John's eyes watch his hand as he again lifted his thumb to his mouth and licked it, sucked it, slowly ran the tip of his tongue around it. Intently focused on John's night-blue eyes, Sherlock could see the very instant of John falling apart, and it made him forget to breathe.

Sherlock slipped his hand between their bodies, ran his spit-slicked thumb over the head of John’s cock, teasing back his foreskin and making John shiver as he circled the glans and traced over the slit at the tip. He kissed the corner of John’s mouth.

“You are perfect,” he breathed against John’s lip, and raised his hand to his mouth long enough to lick his palm, dampen the flat lengths of his fingers. When he slid his hand down along the length of John’s cock, it pulled a whimper from deep in John’s throat. “Gorgeous man,” Sherlock murmured, and stroked John in a rhythm he knew would bring John along steadily, not too quickly, and end not with a shout but with a sigh or—with luck—a string of muttered endearments which Sherlock would relish and file away to call up later, when  he was missing him. “My heart,” Sherlock sighed.

John, in a low, whispery whine: “Sherlock. . .” and Sherlock stroked, kissed, rocked his pelvis against John’s hip, seeking friction.

“My John, my own,” Sherlock whispered, trancelike, floating in and out of his body, his usually-racing brain quiet at last, words and words and words bubbling up straight from his heart and pouring out for his John, his own, his miracle, his heart.

John turned his head slightly, his mouth seeking Sherlock’s, and their lips met, nested together just so, then parted so their tongues slid together in time with Sherlock’s hand stroking John’s cock and his hips pulsing against John’s thigh. John quickly swept his tongue across his own palm and slid his hand between their bodies to stroke Sherlock, drawing a gasp from Sherlock’s throat. John shifted his body so they were nearly chest-to-chest, and they kissed and stroked each other, sighing and moaning into each other’s mouths, and John let Sherlock’s breathless declarations of love caress him, envelop him, forgive him.

“I love you,” Sherlock whispered, then said almost sharply, “John.” John’s eyes snapped open, the rhythm of his fingers slipping along Sherlock’s length stuttered and stopped. Sherlock met John’s gaze with wide-open, silver-flecked eyes, and in a tone of finality—all data culled, all evidence distilled, case closed, he’d solved it—said, “I love you.”

John gathered breath to speak but Sherlock said, “Shh,” and punctuated it with another kiss. “Now,” Sherlock muttered, “I want you to come for me,” and John shuddered, and Sherlock shifted his grip, modulated his stroke, and within a few breaths, John was moaning, closed-eyed, biting his lip, working his hand on Sherlock’s cock arhythmically as he unraveled. “Yes. . .yes. . .” Sherlock encouraged, “My own one. . .”

All at once, John let go a throaty groan that rose to a near-shout, and Sherlock nearly smothered him with a deep kiss, swallowing John’s voice, his breath, and then Sherlock closed his fingers around John’s lost-and-wandering hand and guided him, and with just a few movements Sherlock was coming, sighing, eyes drifting up and closing, mouth seeking John’s again, as if they might never kiss again.

“Sherlock,” John whispered, and held on for dear life.

“Precious,” Sherlock answered, his words a rustle of breath against silk, barely a sound, but John felt them resonate his breastbone, caress his heart and shake it loose. “Mine.”

 

-END-

 

 


	2. Snippet: Sherlock Comforts Angsty!John, Becomes Caretaker

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Snippet of an alternate version of the "Donna's Remembering the Doctor" story, in which Sherlock comforts John.

_In “Code Switch,” Donna has an episode of postpartum psychosis which makes John worry she is remembering her time spent travelling with the Doctor (which she must never do, or “her mind will burn, and she will die”). When I was in the planning stages for a story about how caretaking roles would change during a crisis, I was considering having the key event be the actual birth of the twins, at the hospital, rather than a couple weeks later at home. This is a snippet I wrote of that story, imagining that during labour, Donna was showing signs that something was going haywire with her mind, which would make John worry she was remembering. [I always imagined Sherlock wearing his coat during this scene—wrapping up John in it, holding him close, but it was July, so he wouldn’t have been. #sadface]._

 

*

Out in the corridor, John looked stricken.

“I promised I’d look after her. I can’t. I can’t—“ he heaved. He doubled over then, as if he’d been gut-punched, his hand scrabbling at the rail bolted to the wall. “I can’t _lose_ her,” he sobbed out. He lifted himself back up to standing, shoulders still shuddering with the effort of keeping his breath.

Sherlock gathered John in his arms, held him tight against his chest. “We won’t,” he reassured. Sherlock kissed the top of John’s head—hard—sealing his promise. “We won’t.”

A nurse stood by gawping, and Sherlock barked over John’s head, “Mrs Watson should be given [some anaesthetic that would erase some amount of pre-surgical memory; Sherlock would know the name of it, but I sure don’t] immediately. Run and get a doctor.” The nurse barely had time to rearrange her face into an expression of outrage before he shouted, “ _Now!_ ” She scurried off.

John drew back a bit, his eyebrows still knit with concern, lips pursed tight so that the colour vanished from them, but his breathing had quieted. Sherlock placed a hand on John’s upper arm, the other behind his neck. He looked hard into John’s eyes. “We won’t lose her,” he assured, his tone quiet but decisive. John nodded slightly but looked unconvinced.

*

 

_I just love John saying, “ **I** can’t lose her,” and Sherlock replying, “ **We** won’t,” revealing that Sherlock counts them as a threesome (not that kind of threesome!) instead of considering Donna an interloper in his relationship with John. I think that sentiment was evident, perhaps more subtly, elsewhere in the series. I also can’t resist the soap-operatic hospital hallway scene! DRAMA! Poor John._


	3. Snippet: Donna Texts John From 1926

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> . . .in which Donna Noble texts her friend John Watson from the year 1926.

_A very brief little snippet of text-volleying that sort of gives a flavour of how John and Donna interacted before the Doctor brought her home. I suppose I might still use this, if I ever write something that chronicles the period between John and Donna's internet date ("Date Mates") and Sherlock's Fall, when John was trying to figure out what the hell was going on between him and Sherlock (the usual, plus sex? but we never talk about it or act like we're a couple?), and he and Donna were email/text/phone friends while she ran all over time and space in the TARDIS. Might do. . .but since I haven't yet, perhaps not._

 

*

TXT from Donna: Hello Sweetheart! You won't! Believe! who I've met.

TXT from DrJW221B: Young Richard Branson? Glom on, Donna. . .that kid's going places.

TXT from Donna: Agatha flipping Christie!

TXT from DrJW221B: I'm impressed; I won't lie.

TXT from Donna: The clothes are brilliant. I'm sending you a pictcha. . .

File attached: donna1926.jpg

TXT from DrJW221B: Very pretty. The newspaper's a nice touch, but I've told you b4 you don't have to prove it to me. I believe you.

TXT from Donna: Hardly believe it myself sometimes. Anyway they'll be missing me on the lawn. Quick, what's an old cocktail I can ask for?

TXT from DrJW221B: Ye Olde Sexe on the Beache???

TXT from Donna: You're no help at all.

TXT from DrJW221B: Take care of yourself.

TXT from Donna: Always do!!! :-) <3

 

*


	4. Note to Self

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Notes from the margins of my notebook.

Sherlock doesn't wear a belt.

Stop describing Sherlock's neck as "slim." It ain't.

Basque word for "at risk"-- _Arriskuan_

[Doodle of a heart within a heart]

List of jokey baby names for our soon-to-be-adopted kiddo, including Telegram Sam, Handy Manny, Gamera, and Phineas Ann Ferb

"Human Trafficking" (I did write a drabble based on that phrase: "Trafficking", part 8 in the "Never the Same" series)

Scars

Christmas at Donna's

To-do list including "take off nail polish," and "DUST!!"

"All Mod Cons" (will always love this as a title but will probably never use it)

Floorplan of Donna's bonkers flat on Green Street.

[Doodle of a daisy chain]


	5. The Pitfall of Pet Names

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> . . .in which, Donna wonders if John has a pet name for Sherlock, and really, really hopes it is "Snuggums."

_I had this idea to write a romantic scene wherein it is revealed that John has a special, private pet name for Sherlock, since it seems so unlikely (in the universe I created) that he would call him anything other than "Sherlock." The problems arose when (a) That Doesn't Make A Story, and (b) I Couldn't Decide What The Pet Name Would Be. So, here, for your consideration, a few versions of how that story might have played out. Vote for yr favourite in the comments! (Just kidding.)_

_BTW, I can't find it now because I read it on my fic-app on my phone, but I recently read a lengthy series wherein a demisexual!Sherlock (fneh) got off (yay) on John's terms of endearment for him, the primary one of which was "Honeybee." It was cute. That is not the name I chose to use here, as you will see._

 

*

 

“I’ll miss you, Sweetheart.” Donna was carrying John’s night-table novel as she came into the kitchen. She tucked it into the bag of groceries she’d packed earlier, then slid into John’s arms and kissed his cheek. “Ooh, shaved and all!” she teased. “Got a hot date, have you?”

“No case on, at the moment; unless Sherlock’s found something to dissect, burn, or otherwise demoralize he’ll need distraction from his boredom,” John smiled. He patted Donna’s bottom. “Lest all of humanity suffer his wrath.”

“So it’s a public service, really,” Donna replied, withdrawing from their embrace and busying herself fixing a cup of tea.

John shrugged, grinning. “Least I can do.” He patted his pockets. “Where is my--?”

“Bathroom vanity.”

“I’m lost without you.”

“Who are you telling?”

John returned with his phone, buttoning his coat as he came back for the groceries.

“Please don’t let him eat _just_ the bread,” Donna begged, a vertical crease forming between her knitted eyebrows. “And tell him I’ll know if he does.”

“He knows you couldn’t possibly know that.”

“Or does he?” she challenged. “Anyway, see you Wednesday, Sweetheart.”

 “All right, Missus. I’ll ring you tomorrow. Gi’s a kiss, now.”

Donna kissed his cheek again. “Cologne, too!”

John looked sheepish.

“Cheeky,” she said. “Well, kiss your. . .Sherlock. . .for me. You know, that reminds me: do you call him anything?”

“Call him anything?” John echoed, looking puzzled.

“You know, like a pet name.”

John huffed out a laugh. “Can you imagine?” he asked rhetorically. “Like what, Honey-bun? Poppet? He’d murder me before I got the second syllable out.”

Donna looked disappointed. “Do you really not? Not anything at all?”

John seemed to consider this for a moment before he shrugged and said, “It’s not. . . We don’t go around. . .It’s a bit—“ he cleared his throat “—you know. _Intimate_. This question you’re asking.”

Donna smiled. “So you _do_ have a pet name for him! Please say it’s Snuggums.”

“Donna.” John’s neck and ears were turning pink.

She made a gesture of surrender. “All right, you don’t have to tell me the big secret pillow-talk wuvvy-duvvy name you have for Sherlock. Just so long as you don’t call him Missus Watson.”

“I’m going now,” John said with an arch smile. “Ring you tomorrow.” John started out of the flat.

“Oh! Is it Ducky-Bum?” she called after him. He shut the door.

*

Later, in bed (Sherlock’s nostrils were twitching like a rabbit’s at the scent of his cologne before John made it halfway up the stairs to 221B, and he had thrown himself at John with such force John dropped the grocery bag and the bread fell out), Sherlock’s eyelids were heavy as John slowly dragged his fingertips down the length of Sherlock’s arm again and again, in a way that made Sherlock hum contentedly.

“You know, Donna was asking me earlier today if I have a pet name for you.”

“Oh?” Sherlock’s voice was thick with near-sleep. “What'd you tell her?”

“That it was private.” John took Sherlock’s pinky in his hand and stroked it with his thumb.

“Is it?”

John hummed. “Oh, I don’t know. Not aggressively so. But. . .it’s sort of nice to have it just between you and me.”

Sherlock’s eyes were now fully closed, but his mouth bowed up a bit.

“Anyway, Good night. . .” John murmured, and kissed Sherlock’s sleepy smile. And he whispered the name that was the only thing anymore that was just between the two of them.

*

(OR!)

*

“You know, Donna was asking me earlier today if I have a pet name for you.”

“Oh?” Sherlock’s voice was thick with near-sleep. “What'd you tell her?”

“That it was private.” John took Sherlock’s pinky in his hand and stroked it with his thumb.

“Is it?”

John hummed. “Oh, I don’t know. Not aggressively so. But. . .it’s sort of nice to have it just between you and me.”

Sherlock’s eyes were now fully closed, but his mouth bowed up a bit.

“Anyway, Good night. . .” John murmured, and kissed Sherlock’s sleepy smile. “. . .Sherlock Holmes.”

*

(OR!)

*

“You know, Donna was asking me earlier today if I have a pet name for you.”

“Oh?” Sherlock’s voice was thick with near-sleep. “What'd you tell her?”

“That it was private.” John took Sherlock’s pinky in his hand and stroked it with his thumb.

“Is it?”

John hummed. “Oh, I don’t know. Not aggressively so. But. . .it’s sort of nice to have it just between you and me.”

Sherlock’s eyes were now fully closed, but his mouth bowed up a bit.

“Anyway, Good night. . .” John murmured, and kissed Sherlock’s sleepy smile. “. . .Beloved.”

 

*

 

_Still not happy with that choice, because although it sums up the sentiment, it just doesn't sound right coming out of John's mouth. So. This is not a story. But there you have it._

 


End file.
